What He Doesn't Know
by violeyshives
Summary: In which Dave plotlessly mulls over his feelings for John. AU


Your name is Dave Strider, and your lying on John's floor on top of heaps of blankets that you knew you wouldn't need in this heat; especially since the raven-haired had his arms wrapped around you like some kind of cliche bastard from one of his shitty movies that he had all perfectly organized on the shelf in his closet.

Your glasses are all askew, though you know that if you move to fix them or take them off (normal people take off their sunglasses before bed, right?), you'd jostle him and he might wake up. There was no way you were giving up this position _that _easily, even if the arm pinned to your side by John's chest was starting to fall asleep.

At first, you couldn't fall asleep, even though Egbert had been down for an hour. He passed out right in the middle of your conversation, in which you two whispered most of while staring up at the ceiling. You felt dumb after that, whispering, "John?" a few times and finally sighing. It wasn't long until he was snoring gently; not too loud that it was a nuisance, but with just enough presence for it to actually be considered as snoring at all. You kept looking over at him, watching his eyelids quiver in the dim light.

Then he started moving around almost restlessly in his sleep after what you could only estimate to be around two hours (you'd always cursed your insomnia). He tossed and turned a bit, his head thrown to one side, then the other, and you were afraid he'd wake up and see you staring like a weirdo, though you didn't want to peel your eyes away. He eventually turned facing you, and suddenly there was an Egbert arm wrapped around your waist tightly, pulling you close toward him as if you were some kind of giant teddy bear. It was awkward and surprising at first, and you stiffened, wondering what in the fuck was happening.

And now you had your eyes closed, trying to sleep, or at least _think _coherently, while you're within kissing distance of your best bro in the whole world (not that you were thinking about _that _or anything). His head is rested neatly on your shoulder, his black hair just grazing your jawline. You feel the pressure of one of his legs on top of your knees, as if he was subconsciously trying to press as much of his body into your as possible while you try to stay comfortable. It's a challenge, and you knew that even if you were on the most comfy bed in the world, there'd be no way you could sleep with your heart beating the way it is.

"Gogdammit John," you whispered, huffing gently and taking in the scent of his shampoo. Was that... Strawberries? God, he was so prissy. Not that you didn't like strawberries, or anything...

Actually, you liked strawberries a _lot. _And you figured that they smelled good on John too, though you usually associated him with the scent of the rain on pavement.

You remembered it was only three years that you two met. He was the new kid, and you didn't know a thing about him, save for his name, which he had to announce in front of the class. Though, you thought it was Eg_derp _at first, simply because you could barely hear him over the noise of everybody talking. But that was a great nickname in itself. He came up and sat right next to you, knowing that there were other places he could sit. You just nodded that first time, not talking when he tried to strike up conversation with you. Sometimes, you wonder what changed. Why did you become friends? Even now, you figured it was probably because of his blabber mouth. He could talk for hours without getting bored of his own voice. You couldn't remember eighth grade very well, but you definitely remember that, seeing as how it's an ongoing problem even today.

It was a bit weird how fast you two became best friends. Even more weird was how before John came around, you hardly ever talked to anybody. You didn't have friends because you didn't _need _friends. You didn't _want _friends. Everybody else figured that you were just a loner, but you just thought you were too cool.

_Gog, I was a brat back then, _you think to yourself.

But then you were hanging out almost every day after school, talking on pesterchum whenever you couldn't. You went over to his house a lot more than he went over to yours, mostly because you didn't want him having to trip over puppets and wires. At least John's place was cleaner, despite how creepy those harlequin things were. When he first saw your reaction, he just chuckled nervously and said, "Oh yeah, my dad... He collects things like that." You understood completely.

John's dad was a nice guy, bringing you two out to movies and the like, probably glad to see that John had made a new friend so early. He was so supportive to his son, always telling him how proud he was of him, even when you were there and John would tell him to stop being so embarrassing.

It wasn't until months after you two became friends that he told you he was adopted. You were surprised, honestly, but you didn't make a big deal about it. Just said something like, "Cool," with a shrug. He asked about Bro, what his deal was. You just said, "Well, he's my bro. That's all. I mean, I grew up with him and he's not like a dad, but I don't call him Dirk or anything. He doesn't do that dumb discipline stuff, he pretty much just lets me raise myself, y'know?" You didn't know if it made sense to him or not, but he nodded as if he understood, then laughed about how you didn't have to have rules or anything like that.

You guess your home situation was a bit funny compared to that which John grew up in.

Well, definitely funny, seeing as how he'd probably never fought with swords and puppets or done parkour from roof to roof in the city.

Still, you managed not to fall to your death all those times. So how did you happen to fall into such a cheesy, cliche thing; love?

_Jeez, Egbert's movies must be getting to me. There's no way I just thought something that dumb._

But yes, you think you love your blue-text-bro. And that is not a good thing; not at all. You can't recall exactly when it was that you first thought this, but you think it was about one and a half years ago, right around the time that you guys met Jade and Rose, and John started dating some chick named Vriska. You remember feeling _so jealous, _and Rose picked your thoughts so goddamn easily, like she barely exuded any energy trying to figure it out. And you didn't believe her at first, but then, you did.

And once again, you're wondering; what changed?

And now you're a sap, under the warm arm of the person you love, though he doesn't know about it and possibly never will (you'd seen his gentle let-down of Karkat, and you didn't want to be a chump).

Yes, it's possible he'll never know, and maybe you're being masochistic, but you don't think you want him to.

Turning onto your side as slowly as possible, you wrap your arm around John as well, ignoring the fact that you're starting to sweat from nerves and heat.

* * *

AN: Oh gog this is such a terrible fanfiction. Holy shit. I'm pretty much just reading over this like: "How did I manage to write this piece of crap without my fingers bursting into flames?" So yeah, um... Sorry. I'll write something better when I'm not half asleep, hopefully.


End file.
